The importance of community connections

Hello and welcome, everybody. My name is Peter Downs. Welcome to the first of the post COVID-19 Community Sports Forums. The aim of these forums is pretty, pretty straightforward. It's to give you some food for thought and some ideas about the impact of community sport now and in the future. I first like to start by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land in which we all all sit and pay my respect to elders past, present and emerging.

Now the format is pretty straightforward as well. It's we've two speakers today. We have Dr. Bridie O'Donnell and Paul Kennedy. Some of you may have seen about three or four weeks ago and Offsiders addition on the ABC. That discussed the impact of COVID-19 on Community Sport and Bridie and Paul featured on that episode. And what better way to kickstart this series than to continue that discussion here with a focus on one of the themes that came out of that out of that episode around community connections.

I'd like to introduce you to Dr. Bridie O'Donnell, who is Director of the Office for Women in Sport and Recreation and a great champion of inclusion and diversity generally. And I like I said, Bridie was part of that discussion on Offsiders. A few weeks ago. So I thought it'd be great to get her back and to continue that discussion. Welcome, Bridie.

Thanks, Peter. Great to be here. It's good, we can hear and see you loud and clear, which is good. So Bridie, let's just kickstart. And that discussion, how important, what are some of the challenges now facing community sport? And what do you see as the importance of community connections as we move forward?

Thank you for asking me to be involved. I thought I'd just start by giving a little bit of context about how I've been connected to community sport for the last four decades. I grew up in regional Queensland and have been a club member of a variety different sports as a kid, as an adolescent and as an adult and have competed in gymnastics, netball, touch football, triathlon, rowing and cycling. And what that's meant is I've seen as a as a kid, as a participant, and witnessed parents and volunteers and then been a competitor and seen the impact that being engaged in sport has had not only on my life, but on teammates and on people in various communities. I also completed med school in Queensland and you do a lot of regional and rural work. When you work as a junior doctor and to work in places like Palm Island, where my dad was a teacher, a remote Aboriginal community off the coast of Townsville or Mount Isa, where the majority of the workforce are men and they're miners or nurses and police, you know, and there's not a lot else to do. It's such a extraordinary visual reminder of how much community sport unites people, how provides them with something to do, with a sense of belonging it in me, introduces them to people when they're new to town. And then in metro cities across Australia, we know it's it also creates spaces for people who haven't been included, perhaps in more traditional sports. And we know that there are more choices, more options in bigger cities where there are more populations.

But we also know Australia's got a real reputation for being a sporting country and an active country and if you like, probably a bit mythologically a bronzed Aussie, you know, fit and healthy. But in fact, what we're seeing from a lot of AusPlay data and Sport Australia's data is that we're not as fit and healthy as we would like to be or that we could or should be for health, mental and physical health benefits. And the other thing that's been really prominent in my mind in the last two and a half years in this job is just how many people are underpaid or unpaid in sport and active recreation who work in it. Just the tens of thousands of volunteers across this country that actually keep sport and rec going. They are often parents or passionate people, former players, you know, there the administrators that are actually just running a committee from their kitchen table. And so a lot of people understandably were pre Corona focused on what was right in front of them, which is next week's fixture managing issues. Where does revenue come from? Will we keep that sponsor? And there hasn't always been an opportunity in community sport to forecast. And we know that bankers and doctors and lawyers are often really good at doing pre-mortems, which is basically let's work out what could go wrong and what could be the worst thing that happens. And yet, I think it's fair to say that no one imagined that all sport would get shut down. You know, we're now approaching the end of two months.

So I think the first thing I wanted to remind everyone is that this has been shocking in the true sense of the word, that people have probably got a bit of a psychological whiplash. They probably got a bit of they're grieving the loss of their work or their role in society, their status as a committee leader or board member or a CEO. They're managing a whole lot of personal issues, both the working from home and the staff and their kids. And then they're forecasting the fear of loss of revenue. What this means for them. And so the conversations that colleagues of mine and I have been having with sporting organisations and people who work in clubs is how hard it's been. And I think the other important part of this is that closing the doors wasn't easy, but it was simple. And shutting things down wasn't easy to do. But it was actually kind of a simple way in which to manage a potential health crisis. But now we're in this opening of the doors sort of phase, and that's going to be way more complex than we imagine.

There's going to be multiple layers of engagement required between local councils, schools, parents, sporting organisations, peak bodies, politicians like we've never seen before and like we've never required before. And that actually is both the hardest and the most exciting part because we've already seen in the state I'm in, Victoria an unprecedented level of communication and collaboration between CEOs of different sports, big and large, between various politicians and budget processes, between colleagues in different parts of department. And just broadly, people probably making more of an effort to ask each other how they're doing. And we've never needed to do that before. And yet this is sort of forced our hand. So the crisis has been helpful in that regard. And I think finally, my focus now and this is something I talked about on Offsiders a few weeks ago was, what is the opportunity now for us to do things differently in a positive way, so not bouncing back to the way things always were. Could we bounce forward into a much more innovative and inclusive way to deliver sport and recreation? And for some people, that's never been an issue. Some sports are really great at that of considering everyone, all genders, all abilities or backgrounds. But in other ways, sometimes people have just been doing the same thing they've always been doing for 100 years. And now is chance to make sure, firstly, that your doors are open to all people, people in Australia from all backgrounds and particularly around where we see socio economic disadvantage, because this is going to be the biggest challenge for families and people who are low on money is how do they get back into sporting communities and afford the things they do and stay engaged as best they can.

But we also know that historically sport has been delivered probably far more narrow cohort of sort of sub elite, generally men's teams of more traditional codes. And the explosion that we've seen of professional women's sport and the engagement of girls in nontraditional sports like Aussie Rules, basketball, cricket particularly, and then more niche offerings that have really allowed women and girls to participate in ways they havn't before. And for these are the opportunities that we want sport to maintain momentum. We want them to innovate and we want them to collaborate. So as hard as this has been for everyone and actually kind of excited to ask ourselves as a as a sector, what can we do better? What things do we need to not do anymore? What new ways can we bring in revenue? What new ways can we collaborate? So I'm very keen to hear people's questions and I'm looking forward to hearing what Paul has to say.

Fantastic. The questions are streaming in. Again, it's a bit hard for me to keep up with them at the moment Bridie. But let's try and bring out one or two, one or two. I was very interested myself and there's kind of a theme going through the questions, too, around opportunities that may seem strange to talk about a pandemic and then opportunities that come out of it. But I think you're I think you're right and people are saying there may be some opportunities there. So let's see if I can bring up a couple of the questions on the screen or comments on the screen.

This is from Maia, hi Maia. Looking forward to. Interested to know to in how we make sure underrepresented groups don't get left further behind after all this and how all sport can be more inclusive. Everyone from this point on.

So I think what helps and when we talk about opportunities post pandemic is, for example, we know we're going to be hearing from the Prime Minister later about a potential easing restrictions. And in most states and territories are going to hear from their premier or chief minister about what each of those jurisdictions are going to do in the coming weeks. So if you think about a particular sport or recreation activity that might normally be delivered in a certain way, and that's been bringing in their money and the families, if they have to modify that, if they have to think, okay, well, we can't have as many people playing that thing indoor or we have to do it outside, maybe that actually gives you an opportunity to widely broadcast that to your community and say, hey, I know we can't do wheelchair basketball in this indoor court with the same number of people.

But is there a way we can still provide an activity for people, for kids in wheelchairs who are normally engaged in wheelchair basketball, but that we still want to remain engaged with our club and with activity or have Aboriginal kids in regional parts of the country or rural parts of the country had barriers around cost, transport, geography or even cultural problems of racism within community clubs, clubs that are needing to be more much more mindful about how they invite, include and retain people, how they manage issues, manage complaints, manage broader policies around inclusion and start to model on best case scenario. So when I talked earlier about communication, what we've been having a few times a week in Victoria is conversations with CEOs on what their problems are, but also what some of their solutions are and Vicsport are sharing what those solutions are sharing, how they're engaging with high-performance athletes to inspire younger beginners who are at home. So that's never happened before. And if you've got a small sporting organisation or small club having regular contact with another club says, hey, we tried this.

We had our under-16 men's footy team and they're now training with the girls and they're sharing skill sessions together because everyone spread out anyway and we can't perform the drills in the same way. So we're all doing stuff together and the coaches are learning off each other. So that becomes then professional development for some of the coaches who are less experienced to learn from, probably the more experienced coaches. So everyone's having to reshape their return to play in a way that's code specific or activities specific based on guidelines that are health related. So everyone's been forced to be innovative and those that aren't will actually get left behind.

Yes. Yes, that's very true, isn't it? Yes. One more right on a theme and there is a theme I've been monitoring it as you were talking there, I guess, kind of similar question from Lee Wilson from Netball in Queensland. There is a significant risk disadvantage groups who have become worse off after COVID-19 a sport organsations will have limited resources to commit to inclusion. How do we ensure? I guess it's the same sort of question. And really there is a theme going through that there's a real concern that some of the work being done over the past few years in particular around inclusion diversity could drop off, particularly because of the financial restrictions.

Well, firstly, no real sporting organization and I know how hard it is now, tight money can be. But I do sometimes find myself frustrated that diversity, inclusion officers, a little projects to focus on inclusion are a side business, a side parcel, a nice to have when I want them to be business as usual in the same way that organisations big business is starting to have diversity inclusion as a board agenda item every single meeting and people and culture as a board agenda item. It shouldn't be the last thing you discuss and have an inclusion officer or get a project funding for that specifically. What we would encourage a lot of sporting organisations to do is think how can we be doing that all the time anyway? How can we be asking ourselves the question if we had a kid who identifies as non-binary, does that kid have an opportunity to walk into our club and just say, hey, I really want to play? It's a very it's a really good way to check your own privilege. If sport is generally delivered for you and you never have to ask any questions about things being modified for you or asking permission to do things differently than you're privileged. I'm absolutely privileged. I'm white. I'm well educated. I grew up with parents who love me. They provided a roof for me and they said, just try your best. Not everyone has had that kind of opportunity or start in life.

And I acknowledge that. So if you think that sport is easy and you've never had a problem with racism, sexism or homophobia or, you know, persecution of people, disability, maybe you're not one of those groups. And maybe you need to hear from the voices of those people in your community and say, hey, what would it take for us to deliver a program that ensures that kids with disability or autism are able to come in and play netball here? Or or that people from the CALD community whose English is their second language, what are they need? What do they want to deliver sport that might be safe and active for members of their community that also aligns with their faith or their religion.

Fantastic. Thank you.

Right. Thanks you Bridie. There is a ton of questions, but I think we'll move on. Please keep sending them in, everybody. And thank you very much. It really does help us frame future forums to to be out to see what some of the issues you're raising. Thank you, Bridie. I'll switch over to to Paul now.

Hopefully I can do that.

Well, I have. Guys. Hello, Paul. How are you? Good. Thanks, Peter. Now, Paul, as you can see, obviously from ABC sports journalist.

There we see him in the media every morning. Well, I do anyway. And a great champion and heavily involved in community sport and a great champion of community sport issues as well. So I'll pose you the same question.

Paul, what are some of the challenges now and particularly in terms of the importance of community connections, what are those you see going forward?

Thanks, Peter. So I'll, um, I'll ramble on now as I do. But on this topic, I can get carried away so well, I rely on you to look at the clock for, you know, and wrap me up when you want. But I am very much like Bridie looking forward to sports ceasing the opportunities that have presented themselves. Well, while, someone hit the big pause button. Just some background. So for those people that might just have seen me on the on the news and wondered what our connection to sport is, I've played sport all my life. I've I've coached for about 16 years. I started coaching when I was about 26. I was a playing coach at a football club on the Mornington Peninsula and then fell in love with coaching. And so I've been involved behind the scenes as a coach or a player for for a long, long time. At the moment, my two teams that I that I coach, the under 14s, Karen down in in Frankston, in Victoria and so much. One of my sons is in that. And I coach a school team as well in the school competition in Melbourne. Mentone Grammar not involved with the school, but as a as a coach, I also have which is a much bigger job, three sons and they're aged 14, 12 and 7. And the indoctrination program we've got at the Kennedy household is going very well. They're all mad for sport, which is. We're very busy. The kids played football, cricket, basketball. They do athletics. And. And I've got a strong interest also in Netball from my wife played Netball for a long time. So that's the background.

What I would say the big problems have been for me and and people I know in the community, in the outer suburbs, mainly the mental health of our children and how they've been coping without their games to go to. And all three of my sons have reacted differently. My 12 year old son particularly loves competition. And at times, I've been a bit worried about him. They're all keeping active. We've prioritized finding ways for them to remain physically fit. And we've had some fun with that sourcing different workouts and and just trying to get fit and active and which I know makes them feel calmer as well, because if they don't do it, I notice that they are that they can go into themselves a little bit and sit and just stew over what they can't do. So that's been one thing that we've been able to do in the last few weeks.

With the sporting teams, the local rugby club, which is one of them plays rugby. They've been particularly good at sending out communications for kids to do challenges. So the kids who have a little thing, which I thought was great, which occupied us for at least a week and a half, was the kids in the rugby team would write out their names and then they'd have a little workout for each letter of their name. And that would be their work at my post that they'd share it with each other. So that was great. And that same rugby club, Southern Districts in Victoria, was is also been really good in posting really regular updates on the on the advice given from governments on what is. Where are we? Because one of the big question is, are we going to get it to play any games this year? So that's been good. You know, it's only a little thing, but there's little updates I talk with with my boys. This is what's happening. We may not play this year if we don't. You know, this is bigger problems in the world. So that's okay. But there's a chance and this is what we're doing.

With my other teams, the under 14s and my school team. I've taken to having Zoom meetings. I don't know about everyone, but I've never heard of Zoom about six weeks ago. And all of a sudden I'm having Zoom meetings and having Zoom meetings with with boys at the age of sort of 17, 18, the school team is very interesting because I don't say much to you, but the feedback is when you have a chat to them about what they can be doing and give them some tips on on strength and conditioning, some running things to do, I send out regular running programmes understanding that not all of them are going to do those things. Some skill drills. And I've also been offering some advice on reading and and at least one of them has shown interest in that. So that was good. And the feedback is later on that they love the Zoom meetings, even though, you know, I wasn't getting much from them online. So that's just the way they are. So, the under 14's I did the same with that. I wasn't sure how many would tune in, but they jumped on in there and we had a chat and we're very much looking forward to next week. I think it's going to be a big breakthrough if they do relax the restrictions and have groups of 10 because already I've organized, whether we play games or not, to have that meeting and have a find an innovative way of social distancing and having training. So that's another thing.

The other thing that I'd like to touch on with community connections is I'm very interested in how clubs can thrive in the next 12 months. And I think there's a great opportunity there for clubs. The big things, the big challenge, of course, for clubs and I'm sure everyone's worrying about the same thing is time and money. Money is a big, big worry for particularly my local football club, which are still take a keen interest in. They are worrying at the moment about whether not they come back to play, whether or not they're going to have player payments for the men's team. And I would say absolutely no. Forget about it. Take the stress of yourself and start to reshape the way you run your club. Take player payments out this year and then really cut the hell out of next year and take control as a volunteer of the way that your club is spending money because you haven't got any revenue. The other thing is a little little it might seem like a little thing, but the cost of tape and training and all that, all of that equipment. Well, my wife played netball for for many years and before she went to the games, she tape her own ankles and bought her own tape. And yet the footballers expect to turn up and get taped. And I don't know where they think all of that money's coming from.

So a little thing for our local clubs is to cut the player payments for the men. The women don't get paid anyway. They play for fun. So what's the difference? And also, you know. Bring your own tape. So that's a little thing. The other thing I would say is it's an opportunity to really make a strong connection with your sponsors there. You shouldn't worry about whether sponsors or not you're going to kick in money next year or not, or this this year for instance. You're real. Your real focus now should be on making sure that your sponsors know that you were there for them. So if there's a pizza shop around the corner, that kicks you in a little bit of money every year. Make sure that all of your members at the moment are told when and where they can go and buy their pizzas once a week. I'm not advocating pizza every day of the week, but go on. Go on. If you're going to get takeawya food. Go to this place because they've got hand sanitizer. They are socially distancing. It's safe. Go and support our sponsor because we love them. And I think you're going to feel that that love come back to you. You do the same thing with the local mechanic or or someone and so on. Think about your sponsors and get around them at this time and forget about whether or not they're going to pledge money next year. Understand that if you look after them now, you're building that loyalty and connection and loyalty is a big thing. Constantly we're told that there's no loyalty in sport. There is at community level. And so I could go on about that.

But I am conscious of time and I would just say that. As an organization, you need to as a volunteer, you're in charge. So I really reckon that we need to take back control of our sports as volunteers and stop looking to the big end of town to to take control of the sport. Just this morning, I saw an ad go out for junior players nine to fifteen. And I won't say that the club, but it's an AFL club that's running those programs with the kids. It's 240 bucks over six weeks. That really annoys me. But really, I mean, they can do what they like. They want to continue running those programs and charging families, which I think feeds into what Bridie was talking about before, that that's going to be exclusionary because some people can't pay that money. As a club I would advocate finding and getting as much resources as you can and put them on your Facebook site or your website or YouTube and put out programs, training programs, diet programs, anything you can and give it out for free. And that will be gold for people out there who aren't like me and don't spend their whole time looking at fitness and games. A lot of parents that have no idea. But if you're providing that for them now, how to keep their kids fit and how to keep them active, how to keep their skills up, and that's gold. They don't have to go and pay $200 for this online program, which will be no better than what you can provide as a club and association.

So I think those are the things that you can overcome. You can make it free for people to learn how to play sport. You can build that goodwill online. You've got to assist your coaches. Not all coaches are switched on and off to do Zoom meetings. Let them know that it's, you know, that's going to be valuable for them to to see the coach looking at the player, talking to that player. That's going to keep that player coming back, because that's what players, whether they can verbalize it or not. They love that connection with their coaches. And the other thing is time. I reckon the skills that we've built up through this period of pause are going to be gold for clubs. You're worried about volunteers. I know you are all worried about whether or not volunteers are going to come back and help out, make it easy for them instead of having your two hour committee meeting where everyone goes down the club and sits around and I get carried away and talk about everything. Tell people that if you join the committee, they're going to have a meeting every two weeks or every month? It's going to be on Zoom and it's going to be 20 minutes. So make the most of this different way of communicating and get more people involved and just be conscious. You're going to save some time by communicating like this. I personally am not going to.

When we go back, I'm going to look at ways of saving time because I've enjoyed not driving here, there and everywhere for the sport. But if someone says to me, Paul, can you be on that committee this year? And we're really going to be efficient about the way we communicate. But we want your ideas. We think you've got a lot to offer. I'm going to say yes, because I know that this is a better way. We're all doing it way better. And and I think you can get more people involved that even the local president or secretary that did it for 10 years and it's burned out. I can't do it anymore. They love the club. Get them back in, and show them. We need your help and we need your ideas. And we're just going to do video conferencing. So those are little ways but, Peter, I told you, I got carried away, so have I spoken for too long?

No. It's all good. It's a good, we're bang on time. And there's been a mass lot of questions coming in. I might try and get Bridie on the screen as you and me at the moment. For Paul and Bridie, it's like a regular Skype call, but it is like a regular broadcast. So I'll get to you on the screen too Bridie. So all three of us are there now. I try to summarize because what's happened is on the online there's been a conversation, a debate and the within the chat area among people as you've been talking. And then great, which is kind of separate to this, which is fantastic. But kind of trying to summarize some of the some of the comments that I've seen coming in. They do like the practical advice around survival. Right now, some that practical stuff is really, really important. And I think there's a lot of things going on. But maybe as part of a summary, we want to kind of keep this to that to the half hour or so. Maybe as part of a summary. Bridie, you've heard you've heard Paul talking there. We've had a few questions pop up on the screen and things like that. What are one or two things that put you on the spot question without notice? What what the one or two things that you think are going to be really important in terms of maintaining that connection to your local community for community sport as we come out of the restrictions, as we come out of COVID-19?

I would say that if you're the provider, you're the sporting club or the sporting organization. If you can spend half a day with you and you and the people who you work with, your exec team or your other committee members and had a bit of a brainstorm on what were we doing that was really effective. What was working incredibly well, Pre Corona virus. What was what were people loving? You know, the kids or parents or the feedback we were getting? What were the gaps? Who were we never connecting with? Who would we constantly say we probably should run a program like this, but we've never had the time or the money or the inclination, et cetera. Exactly. As Paul said. There is no money and we're all a bit pushed for time. So those two things become factors that you're not accounting for anymore. And if you can identify. You can start maintaining the stuff that's been working, but maybe start targeting the ways of delivering things or the groups of people that you've always wanted to and never been able to. Now is the time. And in the in the best spirits and interests of sport and recreation where we're hoping to be better. I mean, that's what we come to sport for, to we trying to get better. We try and accomplish skills will be faster or be stronger or be, you know, more talented. Do that in a business as well. Ask yourself, what was I as the leader not doing as well as I could? How do I need to change things? Do we need to bring different committee members in?

Be be honest with yourself about how the organization or the club was working and be prepared to give frank and fearless feedback to others in a respectful way and to receive it. If someone says, hey, you know, we want to try and run this program this way, but, you know, you knew you were never open to suggestions about this or you never wanted a girls team here or you always said that it was too much work to make sure that we had someone who was making things culturally appropriate for people who were Islamic, for example. Say that to that person, we love you, we want you involved, but we want you to try and change the way you do things. Are you open to that? You know, this is something we talk about a lot with having had conversations is ask people the question if no one's ever asked them and just told them, they're probably going to be defensive. So, again, this is about communication and being open to making mistakes and failures, but with an aspiration that you were going to come out of this better and including more people.

Nice. Nice. Perfect. Perfect.

And Paul. Just to conclude, I did put up a little comment from a group who I know called Speak Up, Stay Chatty around the mental health issue. I mentioned that in particular, and it's certainly a concern of Play by the Rules around the mental health aspects in this. Would you kind of kind of summarize some of your thoughts around that just to just to conclude?

Yeah, well, it's been a real eye opener for me and I'll speak more generally rather than talking about some details because I noticed this video go online and I want to embarrass anyone. But yeah, that that age group of 11 and 12. I just see my boys and their friends just going flat out the whole time. But I have seen them, you know, we've talked with our friends about some then being a bit more insular and, you know, getting on their screens a bit more. And it did worry me, but that that go down for a day and then they'd bounce back and be pretty full on for days. So, you know, I'm not a psychologist, so I I talk to my wife about it and she's often better at these things than I am. So as parents, we're just I think make sure that your you're aware of the kids and understand that they're all different even within our house. There's three of them.

And they're so different all three of them. Which means they can you know, it's three big challenges. It's not just one household. So. Yeah, and ask for help. And I think connection with their friends is the big thing. I'm really looking forward to the next stage, perhaps if if all goes well that they can ride around with their bikes. And that's that's the other thing is you don't have to, you know, have to put them on a running program or we'll get them doing their structured stuff if they can ride the bikes with their friends. That's exercise and that's that's keeping them active. And look for ways that they can just have fun without even knowing that they're playing sport. Maybe they might open the monkey bars up again in the playgrounds and the parks. A great way to do that. But yeah, I'm I'm learning like everyone else. The only thing that I would say is, is pay attention and be really careful and keep loving your kids. And keep an eye out for other kids.

One of my son's best mates at school. His dad died this year. And I think the school has been really good of looking after him and making sure that he's got friends around him that he can look to, because sometimes the kids don't want to talk to the adults.

So, you know, make sure that they can. They've got different ways of connecting as well. We talk about connecting, but really it's just people to talk to, have fun with it and try and release the pressure that we can all get on under in those times. So, yeah, that's a tricky. It's good fun. That's why we love being involved in our kids lives.

Nice. Nice way to try to conclude there. Paul, thank you very much indeed. I mean, I can say there's been a mass of comments, which is great. We will be reading some of the questions of how this will be recording. Yes, we will have recorded this and we'll had that to Play by the Rules shortly. One. I just say final thank you to Bridie and Paul. You both. Is quite weird. You both either side of me of the screen, which is quite amusing for me. So, yes, thank you very much for your participation today.

And yes, thank you. And I'll have the recording up very soon. Great work. Keep up the great stuff everyone. Yeah, keep it up.

To conclude then. Thank you again. Once again, everybody for participation. Hopefully that's not too too long. We're trying to learn how to develop this. We're learning as we go along. The recording will be available and Play by the Rules.

Let's just see if I can be really fancy and bring that up to show you where it is. Yes, I can look at that. So it will be on Play by the Rules. If you go to Play by the Rules. It's on the Post COVID-19 Community Sports Forums tab here, which we are building right now. So it is happening. Get rid of that. And you'll see that in the next week or so on there with the other resources as well.

So thanks once again, everybody, for your participation and your comments. Please stay safe and take care and we'll see you in future forums.